Gov. Matt Blunt retaliates!

Gov. Blunt’s office, not to put too fine a point on it, indicated last fall that it was their policy to routinely destroy and delete e-mails. Not so fast, said the press and many Missouri bloggers.

Gov. Blunt is a Republican. Jay Nixon, the attorney general of Missouri, is a Democrat–a Democrat who is now running for governor. Mr. Nixon has indicated a proper interest in what the governor’s office does with its emails. In the circumstances, of course, some suspect partisan motives. But, as we often say here, it doesn’t really matter what your motives are in requesting public records. To us, what matters is whether the government agency is able to provide the documents you have requested and, if not, why not.

Just last week, Gov. Blunt’s office said that is was going to be very, very expensive–$541,000 worth of expensive–to retrieve the requested emails. People laughed and lawsuits were mentioned.